Personally, I have been in favour of a "soft Brexit" that preserves unfettered access to the single market and passporting rights for the City, but not at any political cost - and certainly not if it means submitting to the European Court, which so cynically struck down our treaty opt-out on the Charter in a grab for sweeping jurisdiction.

But what has caused me to harden my view - somewhat - is the open intimidation by a number of EU political leaders. "There must be a threat," said French president Francois Hollande. "There must be a price... otherwise other countries or other parties will want to leave the European Union."

These are remarkable comments in all kinds of ways, not least in that the leader of a democratic state is threatening a neighbouring democracy and military ally. What he is also admitting - à son insu - is that the union is held together only by fear. He might as well write its epitaph.

Mr Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel invariably fall back on the four freedoms -movement, goods, services, and capital  -enshrined in EU treaty law, as if they were sacrosanct.

These freedoms are nothing but pious shibboleths. They often do not exist, and where they do exist they are routinely honoured in the breach. Services make up 70pc of the EU economy yet account for just 22pc of internal EU trade. All attempts to open services up to cross-border commerce have been defeated, to the detriment of Britain.

The sorry saga of the Services Directive in 2006 tells all you need to know about how the EU works. "The French and Germans gutted it," said Professor Alan Riley from the Institute for Statecraft.

The 'country of origin rule' that would have allowed firms to operate anywhere in the EU under their own domestic law was dropped, casualty of the "Polish plumber" scare. The directive did not cover health care, transport, legal services, professions, tax experts, and the like. Germany protected its guilds.

Online and digital trade across borders remains minimal, riddled with barriers. Britain's All-Party Parliamentary Group for European Reform concluded that "there is no single market in services in any meaningful sense."

As Brussels correspondent I covered the parallel fiasco of the takeover directive. This too was sabotaged by France and Germany,  after fourteen wasted years. They reinstated poison pills and a host of tricks in an explicit attempt to stop 'Anglo-Saxon predators' taking over their companies, even as their own companies were free to stalk British prey.

"It was disgusting," one Commission official told me at the time. Frits Bolkestein, the quixotic single market chief, was despondent.  "It is tragic to see how Europe's broader interests can be frustrated by certain narrow interests," he said.

So much for the freedoms of capital and services. Nor has the free movement of people been strictly upheld. France and Germany - unlike Britain - blocked access to their labour markets and welfare systems for East Europeans for seven years after they joined the EU in 2004. It was political decision.

The four freedoms are really just aspirational guidelines, enforced when expedient, neglected at other times. The rigid exhortations from Paris, Berlin, and Brussels that there can be no free trade with Britain unless there is unrestricted migration - even after leaving the EU - is politics masquerading as principle. If they want to find a compromise solution, they can do so easily.

It is an odd spectacle. On the one hand the EU is so insecure that it talks of punishing Britain to deter other escapees; on the other it exhibits an imperial reflex, demanding submission entirely on its own terms, seemingly unable to accept or even to imagine a reciprocal trading relationship based on sovereign equality.

Mr Hollande wishes to bring about the hardest possible Brexit. If this proves to be the EU position - and it may not be, since it is lunacy and he for one will soon be irrelevant - it does at least clarify the issue.

A hard Brexit was never my preference. While the economic benefits of the EU customs union are greatly overstated, it would be no small matter to unwind the nexus of cross-border supply chains that has evolved over decades.

But if that is the only choice, so be it.

David Fuller's view

I will repeat the two most telling paragraphs in this excellent column:

But what has caused me to harden my view - somewhat - is the open intimidation by a number of EU political leaders. "There must be a threat," said French president Francois Hollande. "There must be a price... otherwise other countries or other parties will want to leave the European Union."

These are remarkable comments in all kinds of ways, not least in that the leader of a democratic state is threatening a neighbouring democracy and military ally. What he is also admitting - à son insu - is that the union is held together only by fear. He might as well write its epitaph.

Shortly after the Brexit vote on June 23^rd, Jean-Claude Junker and other EU bureaucrats took a very hard line on the British result.  At first this seemed like adolescent bullying and wounded pride on realising that the UK did not wish to remain in their club.  However, as the attempts at intimidation continued it became obvious that this was not just aimed at the UK – far from it.  These apparatchik-style threats are mainly aimed at other EU countries which may be tempted to follow the UK’s lead.    

Noting French president Francois Hollande’s comments on Brexit, reminds me of the French Foreign Legion, only with double standards.

Here is a PDF of AEP's column.